Residual characteristics and chronic health risk assessment of multiple pesticides in 23 daily-consumed vegetables from Shandong, China: A 4-year investigation.

Pesticide residues in vegetables have raised an extensive concern. However, the residues and integrated risks of multiple pesticides in various vegetables from Shandong province, a leading vegetable producer in China, remain unclear thus far. Herein, we performed a 4-year investigation on residues of 33 commonly-used pesticides in 23 daily-consumed vegetables from Shandong province during 2018-2021, and comprehensively assessed their chronic health risks for different age groups using both deterministic and probabilistic approaches. Among the 1067 samples, procymidone, carbendazim, and thiamethoxam were the top three detected pesticides. Notably, 6 prohibited pesticides, including carbofuran, omethoate, phorate, methamidophos, chlorpyrifos, and fipronil, were also found in vegetables. Based on the maximum residue limits (MRLs) stipulated in GB 2763, carbofuran, omethoate, and avermectins exhibited the highest over-MRL rates. Moreover, 34.7% of the samples contained pesticide residues. Multiple pesticides were simultaneously detected in 10.2% of the samples. Among multi-residue samples, the percentage of samples containing 2 pesticides was the highest, and the most common combination of residues was procymidone + carbendazim. Additionally, 2.3% of the samples were found with pesticides above the MRLs. More attention should be paid to leaf lettuce, kidney bean, leek, and celery, given the relatively higher over-MRL rates. Although we found that both the individual and cumulative exposure risks of these pesticides for different age groups were within established safety limits (below 1), the dietary exposure risks for children were higher than that for the other three age groups. Omethoate, carbofuran, phorate, and avermectins were the key contributors to the potential health risk for inhabitants. Given the ubiquity of pesticide residues as well as the detection and exceeding MRLs of banned pesticides, the potential health hazards of pesticides in vegetables should be continuously assessed. These findings provide a valuable reference for future pesticide management and risk assessment programs.